Theories_of_Personality 7th Ed Feist

Feist−Feist: Theories of

Personality, Seventh

Edition

II. Psychodynamic

Theories

6. Horney: Psychoanalytic
   Social Theory

© The McGraw−Hill^173

Companies, 2009

Chapter 6 Horney: Psychoanalytic Social Theory 167

for the development of neuroses. Rather than benefiting from the need for love, neu-
rotics strive in pathological ways to find it. Their self-defeating attempts result in low
self-esteem, increased hostility, basic anxiety, more competitiveness, and a continu-
ous excessive need for love and affection.
According to Horney, Western society contributes to this vicious circle in sev-
eral respects. First, people of this society are imbued with the cultural teachings of
kinship and humility. These teachings, however, run contrary to another prevailing
attitude, namely, aggressiveness and the drive to win or be superior. Second, society’s
demands for success and achievement are nearly endless, so that even when people
achieve their material ambitions, additional goals are continually being placed be-
fore them. Third, Western society tells people that they are free, that they can ac-
complish anything through hard work and perseverance. In reality, however, the free-
dom of most people is greatly restricted by genetics, social position, and the
competitiveness of others.
These contradictions—all stemming from cultural influences rather than bio-
logical ones—provide intrapsychic conflicts that threaten the psychological health of
normal people and provide nearly insurmountable obstacles for neurotics.

The Importance of Childhood Experiences

Horney believed that neurotic conflict can stem from almost any developmental
stage, but childhood is the age from which the vast majority of problems arise. A va-
riety of traumatic events, such as sexual abuse, beatings, open rejection, or pervasive
neglect, may leave their impressions on a child’s future development; but Horney
(1937) insisted that these debilitating experiences can almost invariably be traced to
lack of genuine warmth and affection. Horney’s own lack of love from her father and
her close relationship with her mother must have had a powerful effect on her per-
sonal development as well as on her theoretical ideas.
Horney (1939) hypothesized that a difficult childhood is primarily responsible
for neurotic needs. These needs become powerful because they are the child’s only
means of gaining feelings of safety. Nevertheless, no single early experience is re-
sponsible for later personality. Horney cautioned that “the sum total of childhood ex-
periences brings about a certain character structure, or rather, starts its development”
(p. 152). In other words, the totality of early relationships molds personality devel-
opment. “Later attitudes to others, then, are not repetitions of infantile ones but em-
anate from the character structure, the basis of which is laid in childhood” (p. 87).
Although later experiences can have an important effect, especially in normal
individuals, childhood experiences are primarily responsible for personality devel-
opment. People who rigidly repeat patterns of behavior do so because they interpret
new experiences in a manner consistent with those established patterns.

Basic Hostility and Basic Anxiety

Horney (1950) believed that each person begins life with the potential for healthy de-
velopment, but like other living organisms, people need favorable conditions for
growth. These conditions must include a warm and loving environment yet one that
is not overly permissive. Children need to experience both genuine love and healthy